How to Oppose the APP Yunnan Project

In our last update we discussed how the Asia Pulp and Paper (APP) project of planting eucalyptus plantations in Yunnan will doom the rich ethnic cultures of the region. To oppose this terrible project, we propose three tactics:

The first is to call upon everyone to cease buying APP’s products. APP manufactures paper products, with the brands Asia Pulp and Paper and APP, on sale throughout China. We should use every channel of communication to let consumers know that APP’s ill-gotten wealth is accumulated at the expense of destroying the natural environment and cultural heritage. To buy APP’s products is to support the destructive activities of APP. Government entities, educational institutions, the media, hotels and restaurants are the big consumers of paper products, so we propose writing to the managers and procurement officers of these institutions to ask them to boycott APP products. We should also write to commercial associations, urging them to also boycott APP products.

The second is to rally as many people and organizations as possible to put pressure on the Yunnan provincial authorities to cease their cooperation with APP. Without the support and approval of the Yunnan government, the APP project cannot go forward. We should lobby the Yunnan provincial government, the Yunnan Development and Reform Commission, the Yunnan Forestry Bureau, the Yunnan Economic Commission to demand that they cease support and approval of the project. At the same time, we should lobby the Ethnic Minorities Commission, the Labor Commission, the Soil Resources Bureau, The Cultural Affairs Bureau, the Environmental Protection Bureau, and the Provincial Tourism Authority to do something concrete to stop the project. Corrupt officials are the same as avaricious businessmen—timid and anxious to please foreigners, so any international organizations or financial institutions working in Yunnan can play an important positive role.

The third route is to bring legal action. The APP eucalyptus plantation project in Yunnan violates the law in several areas. According to the 32nd clause of the Forestry Act, the harvesting of trees from a forest must be authorized by permit, and conducted within the limits authorized by the permit. But APP has been felling trees without permit in many places. According to the Environmental Impact Assessment Act, an environmental impact assessment should be conducted on the project, and there must be provisions for mitigating or preventing any negative environmental consequences of a project. Such environmental impact assessment has not been conducted on the APP project, so the project should be immediately halted. Due to the illegal cutting, and to the lack of action on the part of the authorities, forest resources have been destroyed, the ecology and ethnic culture have been damaged, and the rights and livelihood of the people in the area have been violated. In bringing suit, the initiators should be those people and legal entities whose rights have been violated, and the accused should be the legal representative of the project, plus all Yunnan provincial government organizations that have had a hand in it. The action can be brought in the Yunnan courts.

The Communist Party and the government of China stress that China must pursue a road of sustainable development, and that the country must strengthen the use of the rule of law in the governance and administration of the country. That is an entirely correct policy that receives the enthusiastic support of the entire people of the country. The three methods we propose for opposing the APP project are designed to protect the rich ethnic cultures of the people of Yunnan and also to support the rule of law policies of the Communist Party and the government of China.